


yellow dreams

by burningtoashes



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Emotions, I Don't Even Know, Post-Season/Series 02, Pre-Season/Series 03, What is this really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-18
Updated: 2015-12-18
Packaged: 2018-05-07 09:13:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5451326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burningtoashes/pseuds/burningtoashes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clarke was usually the one he left the fixing to. But she got better at destroying while he wasn’t looking, so perhaps he should work on rounding himself out more too.<br/>---<br/>Clarke leaves to find herself, and Bellamy stays to try and fill the hole she leaves behind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	yellow dreams

**Author's Note:**

> I'm aware that this little ditty is gonna be Jossed out of existence come the end of January, but hey, I felt like writing it. There's not much of a story here, but I hope you enjoy this little stream-of-consciousness craziness anyway.

He’s trying to do it all by himself again.

It’s like time has rewound. He’s back on the launch ship, he’s opening the doors, there’s real light spilling in, Octavia is there, she’s still there, and there’s that blond girl-

No. No blond girl.

He’s trying to do it all by himself again. Trying to keep control, to keep a lid on his panic and everybody else’s, trying to lead the blind. Time has rewound, and how much? How long have they even been here? Days? Centuries? Have any of them kept track? Was there really ever a time that he walked the halls of a space station, hid the tassle of a girl’s toy with his boot so she wouldn’t be found where she hid under the floor?

His life has started three times. Once, in the conventional sense. Once, when he looked down at the bloody face of his tiny baby sister and shushed her quiet. Once, when he watched Octavia, so much grown but still so very much _his_ , take that first step- so uncertain, so clumsy, it was more like a stumble- onto the dirt of the Earth.

Once, when Clarke sat next to him, and his fingers were still curled around that invisible gun, and she said, and she meant it, _I need you_. When their shoulders had brushed and they had just sat there, breathing.

So, four times.

But they’ve rewound to before that now, but he’s aware of it this time, aware of what he lacks, and he holds himself straight and quiet, trying to hide that gaping spot at his side, stuffing his finger in the mouth of his grief, his rage, and soothing it, _shh, shh, be quiet_. Because the adults will see and they will hear, and he can’t afford that, they can’t afford that, he’s got to make sure they’re still in a good position if she comes back.

When. He meant to say when.

…

Jasper won’t look at him. He won’t look at much of anyone, but particularly not him and not Monty, and he’ll up and leave the area whenever Clarke’s name is breathed. Her name doesn’t come up much anymore, and it’s always spoken in a hush.

Bellamy knows he ought to fix it. He ought to sit down, talk with Jasper, try to explain, _apologize_ even if he isn’t sorry. He really liked Maya. She was brave and she was good. But Maya knew what was coming. She had accepted it. She does not keep him up at night. He dreams about the children, with their regulation backpacks and their wide smiles all crumbling to ash because of all the things they could not control.

But for Jasper, it’s just Maya. He looks at them all and he sees her burning, and it keeps his bitterness burning too, burning him alive.

A shake might be better than an apology. A hard cuff to the head. Sometimes you have to put your people over your love. He thinks, perhaps, that Jasper would only scoff at this advice if it’s coming from Bellamy of all people.

But it’s not coming from him. It’s just that Clarke’s not here to say it.

…

Having a goodbye is a luxury. Having her voice in his ear saying _may we meet again_ like she might actually plan on it, that’s a goddamn blessing. At least he wasn’t carted back on a stretcher, tired and broken and with hollowed-out bones, unable to realize that she’s leaving, leaving without a word, without supplies, without even a good weapon.

So he goes and visits Abby in this clinic sometimes.

She’s not much like her daughter. He admires her resolve and her skill, but Clarke is stronger and braver and more broken than her by a hundred degrees. Abby, at least, seems to know this. Too late, but finally.

He calls her Mrs. Griffin the first time he comes in, and she can’t hold back a snort. She wears a tank top, unashamed of the scars on her arms. She tells him to stop standing around and hand her those leaves.

She’s teaching him to fix things. How to disinfect wounds properly, how to stitch them up and bandage them, how to bring down fevers, how to ease nausea. He’s there when Harper comes in crying, and he holds the girl’s hand while Abby rubs her back. Harper quirks her lips up tremble by tremble at him, and he thinks that maybe he can do this from time to time.

Clarke was usually the one he left the fixing to. But she got better at destroying while he wasn’t looking, so perhaps he should work on rounding himself out more too.

…

Every day is the same. He keeps expecting the Grounders to return and storm the walls with an army thousands strong. It’s a matter of time. The Commander must feel guilty for it to be taking so long, but she can’t keep the thrum of the fight from singing through the veins of her subjects. And it will build to a crescendo that she will not be able to ignore. And they will come. They will keep doing their best to wipe his people out.

He thinks of this without much concern. He thinks of bombing them, slaughtering them, a massacre like Finn, without much concern. There’s nothing like pulling down a lever of death to let you know where your priorities lie.

He just keeps his gun close and his spine straight and his heart prepared for the worst. The Grounders. Octavia, dead. Lincoln, gone Reaper again, eating her besotted heart out of her chest. Being imprisoned. Being hung. Never never never seeing Clarke ever again.

Doing it all by himself, every day, for the rest of his numbered life.

…

He goes to Jasper’s tent one evening, because the kid’s been doing a little better lately and Bellamy’s got to do it eventually, and he sits down and he says nothing.

Jasper quirks an eyebrow at him, but he goes back to fiddling with his goggles soon afterwards, apparently accepting his presence. They sit in silence for a long while. That’s probably the best apology that Bellamy can offer him. And Jasper seems to understand, because the line of his shoulders eases up just a little more through the passing hours.

He tries apologizing to Raven too, because if they’d just been a little quicker, a little smarter- but she stares at him blankly, shakes her head, and kicks him the hell out of her workshop.

Abby just ruffles his hair and thanks him. It makes him feel unimaginably small.

When he dreams, he chases after a whirlwind of blond hair. He doesn’t understand how she can function with it down like that, just two twists keeping the worst of it out of her face, how can she see in front of her. He screams apologies after her, he tells her _I forgive you, you’re forgiven_ , he relives that moment when he said _together_ and instead he says _I’ll do it, Clarke, you don’t have to, my soul’s already damned_.

She might have stayed then. She might have despised him, but she might have stayed. He knows how to live with her hating him. He’s still unclear on how to live with her gone. He’s just making it up as he goes along.

…

He’s still a leader here, and there are still things that need to get done. He goes to Abby one day, because it’s occurred to him that they’ve been very lucky so far that none of the girls have gotten pregnant. Or perhaps it’s unlucky- there’s barely any of them, they’ll have to reproduce somehow. She agrees to start checking on implants, advising on techniques. It’s a conversation that makes him distinctly uncomfortable. Harper takes up a spot as Abby’s protégé, and she starts smiling a little more each time he sees her.

He goes to Monty too, asks him to try experimenting with herbs to make a tea that might stop pregnancy. The kid leaps at the suggestion, so happy to be given something to do with his hands.

Even if their people are small in number, there’s too many to all fit in the Arc and the tents are getting worn. He pulls Miller aside, suggests leading a construction crew to make cabins. Bellamy goes to Raven to have her make schematics while Miller leads a crew to get wood. He sends others to find nails and tools.

Their guard is good, but they could be better. He talks to Octavia about training them in the Grounder style of combat. She nods, goes to talk it over with Lincoln, but he stops her and adds something about language courses and culture classes too. She beams.

Jasper’s one of the first to volunteer. Miller too, and Bellamy should probably talk to him about running himself too ragged, but maybe that’s a job for his father.

The Grounders really could overrun them, so he goes to Kane to talk about trying to train some diplomats. He thinks Jasper could be good at it, he’s taking to the language fast, and he knows how to see the best in people. He’s expressing this to Kane, but the man stops him with a hand and an odd smile, a _fond_ smile, and he tells Bellamy that he’s doing a good job here.

Bellamy startles, looks over at the empty space at his side. He’d forgotten about it.

…

If Clarke came back, he doesn’t know how he’d react. He pictures it sometimes, and it’s always different. He cries. He screams at her. He tells her to leave, that they don’t need her anymore, that she’s better off gone. He holds her close and he never lets her go.

Sometimes he thinks he can do this, and sometimes he wakes up at night with his arm outstretched, searching for something yellow in the blackness of his tent. It feels like that moment when Dax held a gun to him, and he went to shoot, but his hand was empty, curled around air, clutching to something simply not there.

He wonders if he imagined her.

He imagines her there again. He imagines her lying beside him, shoulders pressed, breathing together. He counts each inhale, staring up at the top of his tent, waiting for the sun to rise.


End file.
